


If There Was No You

by leigh57



Category: The Good Place (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, First Dates, First Kiss, unapologetic fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-18 08:42:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,525
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21841399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leigh57/pseuds/leigh57
Summary: He’s not her type. He’s not even in the same zip code as her type. If she’s being honest, probably not even the same galaxy. But for some reason he makes her feel as if she’s wearing a very soft fleece onesie, drinking mulled wine in front of a cozy fire at a remote snowy mountain cabin.Not that she’s ever done that.
Relationships: Chidi Anagonye & Eleanor Shellstrop, Chidi Anagonye/Eleanor Shellstrop
Comments: 32
Kudos: 156
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	If There Was No You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gemkazoni](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gemkazoni/gifts).



> This didn’t turn out even a little bit like I thought it would, back when I signed up and had fanciful dreams of endless free days to work on fanfic. I hope my lovely recipient (and anybody else who reads!) enjoys it anyway.
> 
> I’m pretty much obsessed with the idea that Chidi and Eleanor will find each other no matter what and make each other better no matter what, across a thousand lifetimes and a thousand universes. This is just one tiny snapshot of what I think might have happened if they had met on earth.
> 
> The title is from Brandi Carlile’s completely fantastic song by the same name.
> 
> And thanks so much to Ari for reading this and encouraging me the entire way through.

Burgundy sweater vest guy walks into the bar an hour before closing on the Monday before Christmas, eleven hours deep into her shift, which has already featured: some hipster in a fedora puking into his nacho plate, two vaguely bored-looking cops busting a woman for meth possession, and that needledick Brad grabbing her ass three times.

(The only thing that keeps her from kneeing Brad straight in the balls and breaking a bottle of peppermint schnapps over his head is Kelsey’s voice droning in her ear like a goddamn song fragment you can’t shake. _I’m not fucking kidding, Eleanor. If you don’t have the rent by Friday morning I’m throwing your shit off the balcony._ )

The bar’s packed like always at this time of night — disco lights bouncing off the bottles in reflective rainbow circles and Prince shaking the room until she can feel “When Doves Cry” vibrating up the heels she’s been wearing so long she’s pretty sure she wouldn’t clock it if she lost a toe.

Burgundy sweater vest wouldn’t usually be so much as a blip on her radar.

Like yeah, he’s definitely hot, but no hotter than at least 20 other dudes leering at her while they try shitty lines she’s heard four thousand times before and pretend to be creative with their drink orders. This guy is not only dressed like he just finished taping a history documentary for the BBC, but his expression reads like a cross between “I just scattered my favorite grandma’s ashes at the Grand Canyon” and “I’m experiencing a horrifying flareup of my tragic inflammatory bowel disorder.” (She watched some show last week where a chick had IBD. Seriously gross.)

Vest dude stands in the middle of the room for a hot minute before he even walks up to the bar. She’s had time to serve Steve his third Coors Lite (her best fake smile while she pretends to care that his stupid kid made the JV basketball team), swipe twenty bucks from some rando’s wallet when his pathetic drunk ass goes to the bathroom without it, and duck around the corner to take a ginormous swig of Patron, chased with three Wint-o-green Lifesavers.

When he finally does motivate enough to take the four steps to the bar, he sits down but still doesn’t say anything, staring at the twin Xs on the Dos Equis bottle to his left as if they might hold the answers to all the questions in the universe.

They really don’t.

She should know.

But Bruce is already about to fire her for not being “customer friendly” enough, so she sucks in a breath and says with what she hopes resembles a human smile, “What’re you drinking?”

That’s when he looks at her.

Right in the eyes, as if he’s just realized she’s there.

Startled, she holds his gaze for a few seconds longer than feels comfortable, but for some reason she can’t look away.

His eyes are warm and brown and soft and kind and lost.

 _Girl what the fuck,_ she thinks. _No more tequila at work tonight._

But that’s the thing that’s getting to her; he isn’t looking anywhere but into her eyes. He isn’t peering down the lowcut shirt she’s forced to wear or staring at the way her skirt barely covers her underwear. 

He’s watching her face.

 _Get a fucking grip. Make a note to get laid this weekend._ “Um. Can I get you a menu?”

“I’m sorry,” he says, gripping the edge of the bar more tightly than seems healthy for his knuckles. “Do you have anything good for that . . . you know that feeling when you’re about to fall into a bleak, yawning chasm of existential despair?”

She pauses, and the first genuine smile she’s felt all night lifts the edges of her mouth. “Well, I’m pretty sure that anything here will take care of that if you drink enough of it, but if you’re looking for a recommendation, I’d try a shot of Don Julio.”

“Great. I’ll take five.” He scoots closer, elbows on the counter now, shoulders slumped.

“Why don’t you start with two and then evaluate the situation?” 

“Okay.” He grins for a nanosecond.

She pours his shots, focusing on the precise measure of liquid rather than the way his whole face changed when he smiled.

“Hey! Can we get another round over here?”

Glancing at the collection of ASU frat boys celebrating the end of finals with way too much shitty beer, she squeezes her hands into fists, exhales for a count of three, and taps her fingertips on Vest Guy’s cocktail napkin. “Let me know when you reevaluate.”

*************************

An hour and twenty minutes later, they’re the only two people left in the bar.

He’s downed five shots of Don Julio and is now sipping a Rolling Rock.

She wonders if she should call him an Uber.

She wonders what his story is.

She wonders why the hell she cares, is what she wonders most.

She should have kicked him out 25 minutes ago, but for some godforsaken reason she’s inventing shit to do — wiping down the counter with Lysol, filling the tiny plastic tubs with ranch dressing for tomorrow’s wings.

Finally, when her feet are screaming so loud she’s pretty sure you can hear them in Tucson, she stops in front of him, her palms flat on the countertop so she doesn’t sway from exhaustion.

“I gotta close up so . . . you need me to call you an Uber?”

His head snaps up so fast that he almost knocks over his beer. “Oh!” With his inflection, the exclamation feels like a full sentence. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t realize it was this late.” His words run together a little. “Lemme just-“ He reaches into his back pocket. Then the front pocket. Then, increasingly frantic, into the pockets of the tweed jacket he tossed across his lap when he sat down.

“I must’ve-“ He checks the jacket one more time. “Shit. I think I left my wallet at the hotel.”

_Of course he did. Why would this night end any other way?_

“We take Apple or Google Pay,” she says hopefully. Bruce is gonna kill her if she lets a sixty buck tab walk away unpaid.

“Yeah I uh-“ He fidgets with his glasses. “Left my phone at the hotel too.”

She takes a deep inhale to respond, but before she can say a single word, the words come tumbling out of him. 

“I was only gonna go down to the hotel restaurant and get a burger or something. But I got lost on the way to the main entrance and ended up outside by the pool so I just started walking.” He takes another gulp of beer. “When I got here there was this Jeep in the parking lot with a vanity plate that said ‘Destiny,’ and I was like, ‘Well I can’t argue with that, right?’

“I guess you-“ That’s as far as she gets.

“My girlfriend broke up with me. I mean that’s not why-“ He pulls off his glasses and rubs his hands over his eyes. “That’s not why I decided I should take a vacation. I’d been working on this article for nine months, and two days ago I submitted it to my boss to review for publication.”

She watches him, the way the sadness in his voice spreads through his whole body like the coating on a Skittle when you put it in seltzer. 

“He threw all 85 pages in the trash and told me I should stick to teaching.” He twists the edge of the napkin between his fingers. “Then I went home to tell my girlfriend, but all her stuff was gone. She just left a note that said, ‘I told you that you needed to decide by Friday.’ I didn’t even remember what I was supposed to decide!” He runs a thumb over the rim of his beer. “She even took Hansel and Gretel.” 

She must look even more puzzled than she realizes, because he mumbles, “My fish” as clarification.

Eleanor leans forward, elbows resting on the edge of the bar. This dude obviously needs to talk, and although she sailed straight past tired to mindnumbingly exhausted at least two hours ago, she honestly has nowhere she needs to be. “So where are you from?”

“Australia, at least at the moment. I teach ethics and moral philosophy at St. John’s College.”

“Hold up. You’re from Australia and you decided to take a vacation in Phoenix?”

“No, I wanted to go to Boston or New York City.” He sighs, and for the first time since his bar backstory spilled out, his face relaxes a little. “But when I got to the airport I couldn’t decide, so I panicked and just told the guy at the counter to put me on the first flight to the States.”

“Wow. That’s-“ She fiddles with the edge of her earring. “A story. And I’m usually the one with the wild stories.”

Vest Guy glances at his watch and stands up suddenly, grabbing the edge of his barstool for support. “I am _so_ sorry. I’m absolutely good for the bill. I mean, I’m an ethics professor. I’ll be here tomorrow fifteen minutes before you open.”

“Don’t worry about it. I’ll cover you.” she hears herself saying.

_What the hell are you doing?_

“I’ll be here,” he repeats, very quietly and very sincerely.

“What might be the weirdest thing about this super weird night is that I believe you.”

She pulls out her phone and taps the Uber app. “I’ll get you that car, Vest Guy. What’s your name?”

“Chidi. Chidi Anagonye.”

*************************

Not only does he show up, he shows up with flowers.

She’s almost late as usual, clutching her triple shot vanilla latte in one hand while she shoves the edge of her shirt into her skirt with the other. It’s strangely warm for December even here, and the sweat pricking along her spine isn’t helping her Christmas spirit in the least.

But she stops short when she sees him standing a few steps from the door, wearing yet another sweater vest (this one’s kind of moss-colored) and holding one of the prettiest bouquets she’s ever seen. White roses, red carnations, and a bunch of other stuff too fancy for her to name.

“I told you I’d be here!” he exclaims before she can say a word, and then he extends the flowers. “I don’t even know your name, or if you like flowers, but I figured it was the least I could do after I made such an _ass_ (the intense emphasis he puts on the word is irritatingly adorable) out of myself last night telling you my life story when you were just trying to close up and go home.” 

“I’m Eleanor,” she responds, still winded by the dash from the bus. “And guys don’t usually bring me flowers even when I sleep with them.”

_What the hell is wrong with you?_

But she takes the bouquet from his hand, because his expression is so soft and hesitant and unsure.

“Well those guys should try doing better.” He flashes her the quickest of smiles and then shrugs. “And I find flowers soothing.” He takes his wallet from his back pocket then and pulls out two bills. “Thank you for getting my tab last night. This should cover it, I hope?”

In the bright sunlight, it takes her a second to realize he’s holding hundred dollar bills. “Dude, stop.” She laughs, because holy shit this is all so bizarre. “Your bill wasn’t even a hundred.”

“Well consider it a therapy payment for listening to me ramble.”

“I’m serious. A hundred is more than enough.” She has no idea why she’s arguing with him, when Standard Eleanor wouldn’t tax a second brain cell before taking the money.

“Just take it. Please.”

Whatever nutty impulse he seems to activate in her makes her want to keep protesting, but she’s sweating, very close to late now, and he looks super stressed.

“Thank you, Chidi.” She tucks back a piece of her hair that’s slipped out of her haphazard ponytail. “I’d better get inside before my charming boss fires me.”

“Yeah, go! I didn’t mean to keep you.”

“You’re more fun to talk to than the regulars anyway.” She turns to go, maneuvering her coffee awkwardly into the crook of her arm so she can open the door.

“Hey Eleanor?”

“Yeah?”

“Would you like to-“ He pauses and swallows, as if he popped a pill that’s bigger than he realized. “To go out sometime?”

He’s not her type. He’s not even in the same zip code as her type. If she’s being honest, probably not even the same galaxy.

But for some reason he makes her feel as if she’s wearing a very soft fleece onesie, drinking mulled wine in front of a cozy fire at a remote snowy mountain cabin.

Not that she’s ever done that.

“I’d love to,” she responds before she can ruin it by thinking more, and his whole face brightens. 

“Great! I’ll-“

“You can call me at the bar,” she says, tilting her head toward the door. “God knows I’ll be here.”

“I’ll do that.” He grins and looks down at his feet, rubbing the toe of one shoe into the dust on the sidewalk. 

She slips through the door into the half darkness of the bar, wondering what the hell kind of weird demon has overtaken her psyche and made her attracted to this nerd.

*************************

He calls her at the bar later that night.

“I wanted to make sure you didn’t get in trouble.”

“Trouble?” She can barely hear him over Jason and maybe a dozen of the other guys from Dance Dance Resolution singing Grandma Got Run Over By a Reindeer super off key. (She’s not mad though. Jason is the only straight dude she works with who doesn’t try to hit on her and makes sure she gets to the bus, no matter how late it is.)

“Yeah, for the money?”

“Oh!” She can’t fight the smile that tugs at the edges of her mouth. “No, everything’s good. My rent’s not due until the end of the week anyway.”

After a long pause (she mixes a Moscow Mule), he says, “You don’t happen to want to go out on New Year’s Eve, do you?” Before she can open her mouth, his words are speeding forward again. “I’m sorry. What am I even thinking? I’m sure you have a date. That’s fine. We can go out after the New Year. Or not at all. Not at all is fine too if you changed your mind.” He sounds out of breath by the time he’s finished.

And she does actually have a date, with this personal fitness instructor named Matt or Mike or something, who drives a green Camaro and wears shirts that are definitely too tight for him.

“I don’t have a date,” she lies. “Pick me up here at five? I get off early because I’m working today.”

“Perfect!” 

She hangs up, pretending not to notice the warm little glow of excitement she can feel in her chest, like she’s fucking E.T. or something.

*************************

She doesn’t see Chidi before their date, but he texts her every day.

_How’s your shift? Are those ASU guys bugging you?”_

_You don’t hate Mexican food, right? I mean it’s fine if you do but. Do you?_

_What’s your favorite Christmas movie?_ (She tells him it’s _Miracle on 34th Street_ , isn’t about to admit that she avoids all Christmas movies as much as possible because they only remind her of one more tradition she’s not part of.

_Did you ever watch Daria? I used to love that show._

She’s never met a guy less worried about pretending to be cool.

And if she had met said guy, she knows she would have hated him.

*************************

In the days leading up to their date, she cleans the entire apartment from top to bottom, including pulling stuff out of the cupboards and wiping them all down with Lysol. And she tells herself it’s because Kelsey’s having a New Year’s Eve party, but she’s never done anything more taxing than put a few dishes in the dishwasher and wash her own laundry since she moved in six months ago.

She doesn’t steal a single dollar from a customer, although five different dudes leave their wallets sitting right in front of her on the bar.

And when Steve comes in looking even more bummed out by life than usual, she pauses when she puts down his beer and looks right at him. “Hey, how’s your kid’s basketball team doing?”

His whole attitude brightens, and she’s not even mad when he launches into a ten minute monologue featuring a lot of phrases she only pretends to understand.

Maybe basketball isn’t that bad.

Maybe she’s just lost her mind.

*************************

When she steps out of the bar into the pink and orange sunset, Chidi’s waiting for her. He’s swapped the sweater vests for a cream-colored cable knit, and he’s holding a single lily. 

When he sees the simple black sheath Kelsey offered to loan her, ( _Shit Eleanor, I don’t know what’s up with you this week but you should keep it up whatever it is!_ ), he says, “Damn. Like, wow.”

And she actually blushes.

*************************

Chidi’s surprise is this dinner and dancing party thing at an unbelievably good Mexican restaurant in Flagstaff. He says he wanted it to actually feel like winter, and damn if it isn't lightly snowing by the time they get there.

Eleanor sips what looks like very expensive Merlot and says, as she looks at all the people around her and considers all the Mercedes, BMWs, and Cadillacs she saw in the parking lot, “I admit I’m not exactly an expert, but I didn’t think teaching philosophy paid that well.”

Chidi laughs. “Oh it doesn’t, not at all. I just kind of accidentally saved quite a bit because-” He takes a sip of his own wine and fiddles with the edge of his napkin. “Because I could never find much I wanted to spend it on.”

“I also really didn’t think I’d be your type,” she blurts out. _Fuck, did you really have to say that right now?_

“Oh you’re not, not at all.”

Her eyes widen. She didn’t expect his choice to match her bluntness to sting quite this much.

He must realize how it sounded, because his voice goes suddenly ten shades softer and he adds, grinning as he takes another sip of wine. “But I haven’t looked forward to a date this much in years, so I’m pretty sure I need to reevaluate.”

She relaxes, dipping her chip into the salsa and watching the way the reflection from the lights makes his brown eyes even shinier.

*************************

She doesn’t even realize it’s midnight when the countdown starts.

They’re on the dance floor, swaying back and forth to Elvis’s version of “I Can’t Help Falling In Love With You.” Chidi’s arms are snug around her waist, and it’s a good thing, because after three glasses of the Merlot and an impressively strong Mexican coffee to round out the night, she’s a little tipsy for sure.

She startles when she hears the shouted “TEN!” and looks toward the huge flatscreen in the corner to see the bundled revelers in Times Square.

“NINE! EIGHT!”

Chidi’s eyes are wide and vaguely panicked. He swallows. “I didn’t realize it was-“

“SEVEN! SIX! FIVE!”

“I mean you certainly don’t have to-“

“FOUR! THREE! TWO!”

“Because I don’t expect-“

“ONE!”

She bounces to her tiptoes and kisses him.

His surprised inhale makes her smile against his mouth, but she doesn’t stop, and after a beat where he seems to be pausing to make sure she doesn’t wanna change her mind, he’s kissing her back.

And it feels so goddamn good.

Like nothing she’s ever felt before in her life, and wow, she’s kissed so many guys.

Chidi’s lips are soft and warm and he tastes like coffee, tequila, and whipped cream.

But that’s not why this is different.

It’s different because while okay fine, kissing him has her instantly four thousand percent more turned on than she was ten seconds ago, the change isn’t only in her body.

It’s everywhere — her heart and her mind and her soul.

And she doesn’t even really believe in the soul.

But she keeps kissing him, until her face is flushed and her heart is racing and her lips feel tingly from his mint chapstick.

When they finally stop to breathe, she glances toward the tv. The people in Times Square are kissing and laughing and yelling. The music has switched to “Crazy.” She honestly doesn’t even like this song, it’s annoying and overplayed.

Still.

In this exact moment, it feels strangely relevant.

She closes her eyes and snuggles her forehead into Chidi’s neck. “Hey, do you believe in soulmates?”

Wow she’s drunk.

He pulls her closer, brush of his breath on her forehead. “Didn’t used to.”

“But?”

He kisses the edge of her cheekbone. “I’m thinking I might have been wrong.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was my first ever attempt at a fic in this fandom, and I’ll just leave apologies here if that’s super evident. Happy holidays and best wishes for an awesome 2020:)


End file.
